the lost israel of the SOVIET far east 

DAY 1 – Khabarovsk

• Meet-and-greet at Khabarovsk International Airport and introductory briefing about the Soviet Far East.

• Khabarovsk Soviet Tour: Lenin square, Lenin stadium, Bolsheviks’ Memorial, Komsomol Square, State Drama Theatre and plenty of USSR-era architecture and monumentalism.

• Overnight in Khabarovsk.

DAY 2 to DAY 3 – Birobidzhan

• Today we'll head for the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, also known as the Soviet Zion or Israel of the Far East, the one and only Autonomous Oblast within the Russian Federation.

• The Soviet government dreamed then about the idea of resettling all world Jews to the USSR, in a designated territory where they would be able to pursue a lifestyle socialist in content and national in form: the location that was initially considered in the early 1920s was Crimea, which already had a significant Jewish population, however, an alternative scheme, perceived as more advantageous, was put into practice and, eventually, the settlement of Birobidzhan and the surrounding region were chosen by the Soviet leadership as the site for the new Jewish state: at its height in the late 1940s, the Jewish inhabitants in the region peaked at around 46,000-50,000, around 25% of the entire population.

• We'll spend two full days in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, codenamed JAO, exploring both the capital Birobidzhan and little traditional settlements scattered around the Taiga.

• Highlights of your stay in the JAO will include:

  • an impressive Bolshevik memorial towering over the town of Volochaevskaya (just a few miles west of Khabarovsk);

  • the rarely visited early Jewish settlements of Birofeld, Nayfeld and Valdgeym (the Soviet answer to the kibbutz).

  • and, needless to say, the city of Birobidzhan itself—with its curious mixture of synagogues, churches, and Soviet monuments.

• During your time in the region, you'll also have the unique chance to meet with rabbis and other representatives of the local Jewish population, who will share with you their food, their stories and the secrets of their endangered culture.

• Overnights in Birobidzhan.

DAY 4 – SHALOM Shalom!

• After sharing a last Yiddish meal together, we'll take care of your transfer to either Khabarovsk International Airport or Birobidzhan Train Station for your trip back home and/or your connection to yet another exciting destination in the region such as Mongolia, Manchuria or Yakutia.

• End of the tour.

995 €

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